Blood Bound
by BlownAway
Summary: Post OOTP - A bond of blood keeps Harry safe, a bond of blood endangers him. Blood binding should never be undertaken lightly...
1. Lady Vampiress and Bacon Rituals

**Disclaimer: **Not mine. Did you really need telling that?

**Author's Note: **The first chapter of my first fanfic – very much a work in progress. I hope I've ironed out most of the mistakes in here, and I apologise for any that remain. Reviews HUGELY appreciated. (Re-posted to try to correct horrendous formatting…)

**Chapter One – Lady Vampiress and the Restricted Bacon Rituals**

Hermione pushed her hair back behind her ear, as she sat at the battered desk in a corner of the Library. She was surrounded by piles of heavy tomes, and was writing notes on a piece of parchment with her right hand, while her left held open another ancient book. Her eyes flicked quickly over the lines, her hand occasionally shifting as she made notes with her quill. She didn't stop her rapid scanning when she heard a pair of footsteps approaching, or when a person sat on either side of her.

A pale thin hand picked up the pages of parchment that were already covered with her neat words and began flicking through them. Hermione, however, didn't react until another hand, slightly larger and lightly freckled, placed a bacon sandwich on the page that she had been reading.

"You surely don't think that Madam Pince didn't notice that, Ronald Weasley?" she hissed.

Her friend shrugged, unrepentant. "If Madam Pince has eyes, she'll have realised that you've been in here since eight this morning, and missed _all_ your meals. Honestly, we're doing her a favour. Think of what Pomfrey would say if she just let you collapse from hunger in here."

Hermione shook her head at Ron, before taking the sandwich and stowing it, more prudently, under the table. It was a kind thought, but Hermione couldn't help reflecting that only Ron would consider a skipped breakfast and lunch as basis for concerns over starvation. Once she was sure that the librarian hadn't noticed the food, she ate it cautiously. It was a good thing Madam, Pince _wasn't _all-seeing, really. There were more than a few questionable texts in the stacks on the trio's table.

"How was the game? I heard you won." Hermione addressed this to Harry, on her other side. He was still reading her notes from the day, occasionally comparing them with those from the last week, which were piled high under the desk. He shrugged at her question, but as she kept staring he relented and answered.

"Okay. Ron and Ginny played well. Have you found anything new?" Harry's voice was determinedly low, and he focused on the table as he spoke. Hermione wished that she could hug him, like she would have done last year. After Sirius died, though, he had drawn his personal space around him like a cloak, rarely relaxing even with Ron and Hermione. Now, after all the talk…it was rare that he looked anyone in the face. Both Hermione and Ron were pinning their hopes on this research to give them the answer. Otherwise, they couldn't see what they could do for their best friend.

"I think that we've found most of the details for this. But…we really need to get books from the Restricted Section. Two of the spells needed can only be found there, and some of the notes on the potion are too vague. Restricted books should give a better idea of the effects, as well."

"Effects? We know the effects, don't we? Better control for Harry, a bit of magic bleeding over into us to get rid of the overload, and that's it – hip hurrah and butterbeers all round."

"This…parts of it at least, Ron…they're dark arts. The way that the charms need to be combined will affect the results, and these books won't talk about that. Besides, the authors of these books haven't tried to do more than one at once. Harry? Can we do it tonight?"

Harry fixed her with his dull green eyes again. "Fine. I'll fish out the cloak."

Hermione breathed a sigh of relief. He was going to help. It was hard, now, to tell what he would be willing to do. Hermione had made herself encourage him to sneak to the kitchens or Hogsmeade, just to stop him sitting, night after night, in the same seat in the Common Room, staring into the fire where he had talked with Sirius. Now, he moved to the seat at the end of the desk, where the books from his personal research were still laying from the previous night. Since he came back to Hogwarts in September, Harry had been obsessively researching Occlumency, possession and hunting for any reference to the Veil that they had seen in the Department of Mysteries.

Ron grabbed a clean sheet of parchment and scrawled a note on it, passing it over to Hermione. She read it, frowned, and wrote a reply.

_So how's it going really? _

_Have you got ANY idea how complicate and dangerous this is? Two archaic rituals, one after the other…there's no way to know if the second will even WORK, and I don't want to think about the side effects. From what I've read, we may have a major problem…I'll tell you after I've read the books we're getting tonight._

_How was the match? Really?_

_Not good. If the Snitch hadn't flown right in front of him, he wouldn't have caught it. And the team are all bloody IDIOTS. Even Ginny's scared of him! Kirke and Sloper are practically too scared to protect him from bludgers. They might try to vote him off the team._

_Can they vote off their captain?_

_Not really, but they can make it impossible for him to carry on. It's practically that bad, now. They only don't now because I'D make their lives hell. _

_It would help if he looked like he cared that they all whisper about him, rather than being so…closed in._

_I tried to get him to stay for the party, but he wouldn't. He won't want to go to dinner tonight, either._

_We can get food from the kitchens and force him to eat something, at least. I doubt he's eaten since yesterday, either. _

Hermione put her quill down and flexed her cramped fingers.

"Have either of you done that transfiguration essay? McGonagall isn't going to cut you any slack, despite…everything. You could do it now."

"And you'd rather supervise our efforts and do the extra reading than carry on with the research." Harry's voice was slightly hoarse, as it always was these days, and Hermione had to suppress a wince when she heard it. McGonagall and Dumbledore _knew_ about this, she was sure. She'd even spoken to the transfiguration professor about it, but still they said that nothing could be done to protect Harry from the dreams which caused him to scream so much that he damaged his voice. Ron had said that, one night, the silencing wards that Harry set about his bed as a matter of course had failed. All of the boys in Gryffindor Tower had been woken by his cries, and this just added to everyone's discomfort around the Boy Who Lived.

"There's only so much you can read about – this – before your mind rebels. And I've been reading it all day." Hermione cursed herself the moment the words left her mouth, because Harry had immediately looked at the floor, no doubt feeling guilty that she had had to.

Ron, thankfully, picked up on this quickly. Hermione shot him a grateful look as he replied.

"Sweet Merlin! _Finally_, something Hermione gets tired of reading! And it turns out that you are a mere mortal, after all."

"A mere mortal who might not want to help with your essay now. Besides, get that done now, and tonight we can start learning some of these charms we'll need."

"Right, oh evil taskmistress. Okay, so…_Theories of the transfiguration of inanimate objects into living creatures_…How on earth am I supposed to answer this?"

"Did you even listen to the lecture, Ron? Harry, are you going to write the essay now, too?"

He nodded shortly, and moved again so that he was sitting next to Ron. Hermione breathed a sigh of relief and opened her own textbook.

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After visiting the kitchens, where Hermione and Ron had nagged Harry into accepting a baked potato from Dobby and eating it, Ron and Hermione headed up to the Room of Requirement, while Harry went to Gryffindor Tower to get his Cloak. Hermione took the lead of walking up and down the corridor, concentrating on the room they needed.

Please, just a place where we can practice, with the runes already there so that we don't need to draw them out, where we can practice this in private, where it won't all go wrong…

As they walked through the door that appeared, Ron's jaw dropped. It was a large room, roughly as large as it had been when all the DA members had used it, and it had familiar-looking cushions around the walls to sit on. In the centre of the room, however, was a large bronze cauldron that sat squarely in the centre of a pattern of runes and lines. Hermione studied them, then pulled out yet another piece of parchment and began copying them down, trying to ignore the sight and sounds of Ron eating the cream cake that the house-elves had slipped him as they were leaving the kitchens. Once the sketch was complete she took two more sheets of parchment out and transferred the diagrams onto them.

Harry arrived a few moments later, and his eyes widened as he took in the room.

"So, this is what it will look like?"

"Yep, though we'll have to draw it out ourselves on the night, of course. Here, I've marked on these sheets the bits you'll have to draw. We need to have them memorised for the night." Hermione handed them each one of the diagrams.

Ron frowned as he took his. "But, if the room provides them, why do we have to draw them out? Less chance of a mistake if we use these, surely?"

"Firstly, drawing it out ourselves gives the ritual more chance of succeeding because it shows such clear intention. I don't think we should use chalk, either, I'm sure I read about potions that were used in ritualistic markings in the past, and that would be much better considering that we're not entirely sure that the two rituals will combine properly-"

"And the second point, Hermione?"

"Oh, sorry. Secondly, Ron, we can't carry out the rituals here. There's too much background magic in Hogwarts, and it would interfere with all of ours that will be flying around. _Raising Power with Rituals_ advised that it's done in a place where there isn't any spell residue, to avoid side effects."

"So we can't do it then." Harry sank onto one of the cushions and wrapped his arms around his knees pensively. "There's nowhere around here without magic."

"Yes, Harry, there is. I thought we could do it in the Shrieking Shack. Well, we can brew the potions here so long as we don't use anything from the room that would vanish when we left."

"No – if we brew them here, then anyone wanting to know what we're doing could walk in on them. Moaning Myrtle's bathroom is still safest." Harry's voice trailed off towards the end of the sentence, as he remembered the horror he had felt when Pansy Parkinson had presented the list in Dumbledore's office.

Hermione nodded briskly, not wanting him to slip into brooding again. She drew her wand and pointed it towards the far wall. "I've found all the charms for the first ritual – we'll only need four. We do have to be precise though, so we'll need to practise loads."

Ron and Harry exchanged a brief amused glance, before drawing their own wands and moving to stand next to her.

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At midnight, Hermione called an end to the practising, saying that no matter how little sleep Ron and Harry could survive on, she needed to be awake for her Arithmancy test on Monday morning. Harry and Ron were relieved as they put away their wands – the charms were extremely complex.

Ron muttered to himself as he tried to remember exactly how to cast each one. "_Siblis Sugesto_ to the right on 'Mione, then to the left on Harry. A large clockwise circle starting from the forehead, finishing with a jab once you get to the top again. Walk anti-clockwise around the circle to where 'Mione was standing. _Veritas Expecto _to the right, then left. A cross, downstroke first, from forehead to feet. Walk to the next place. Then _Gesund Heita Obligaro_, right and left. Five pointed star, starting from the forehead and going to right foot, left shoulder, right shoulder, left foot, forehead. And we need to do it at exactly the same time, or it all gets buggered up.""

"Brilliant. And after that?"

"The whole weird cutting thing. You, dearest Hermione, are going to research spells we can use to cut our wrists, then we press them together. We'll need to collect two full vials of the mixed blood, for each of the potions. How am I doing so far?"

"If only you spent as much time on Transfiguration as you have done on this…" Hermione grinned at him. "One vial is for the second ritual, otherwise you'd have to let blood twice. The other vial gets divided three ways and put into goblets…"

"Yeech! 'Mione, you want us to drink our own blood? No wonder you need books on dark arts." Ron pulled a disgusted face and leaned down to stage-whisper to Harry, "Tell you what, lets run off to Australia, and leave Lady Vampiress here to muck about with blood."

Harry smiled for the first time since he had entered the room. "Now why didn't I think of that? Australia, here I come!"

Hermione poked Ron and savoured the brief look of uncomplicated humour on Harry's face, as the trio left the Room of Requirement under the invisibility cloak. Though they were all slightly too tall to comfortably fit under the cloak together any more, frequent use and necessity had forced them to find a way. Ron, the tallest, walked in the middle like a hunchback while Harry and Hermione walked sideways next to him, so as to take up the least possible space. Slowly and crablike, they reached the Library. Ron muttered, "_Alohomora_", and the lock clicked loudly in the silence. After shuffling through they made sure the door was once again shut fast and locked, before shrugging off the cloak in relief. Ron rolled his shoulders and was rewarded with cracks.

"I swear, that cloak is getting smaller by the day. Are you sure you can't do a lengthening charm, 'Mione? For the sake of my neck?"

Hermione wasn't paying any attention. She was already in the restricted section, reading the titles by the faint light from her wand. Occasionally she would mutter to herself, or take a book down and leaf through it. When Harry headed over to the prohibited books as well, Ron followed him. He pretended to be scanning the titles himself, but when Harry took down a book and opened it, he glimpsed the title: _Your Mind is My Mind; A Practical Guide to Legilimency. _The next one selected was _Blood and Soul Arts – The Complete Guide_. By the time Hermione had finished retrieving the books they needed, Harry had purloined three more, and he stuffed them in his bag while Hermione, more carefully, packed away those for the rituals. If he knew Ron had been watching him, he gave no sign of it.

Whispering _Nox_, the three of them snuffed out their wands and drew the cloak over them again. The Library door opened and closed to the faint protest, "Geez, 'Mione, be careful where you swing those books!"

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An intriguing enough start? I hope so. Maybe it was even intriguing enough that you want to press that review button…or maybe you just want to flame. That's fine too. Even fanfic writers need to keep warm.


	2. Plain Covered Books and Risk Assessments

**Disclaimer: **I don't own them. I just like making their lives difficult.

**Chapter 2: Plain Covered Books and Risk Assessments**

In the Gryffindor common room, Ron and Hermione watched helplessly as Harry turned away from them and headed to the dormitories. Ron briefly considered following, but Hermione stopped him with a hand on his arm.

"I promise you, he won't want to talk."

Ron shook her off in exasperation. "But I need to keep _trying_, 'Mione. If he just opened up about what's bugging him…"

"We know what it is. The same as always." She led Ron over to an empty window-seat and sat down before she carried on talking. "Honestly, they could at least have saved him some butterbeer. He _did_ win the game for them." She opened her bag and began extracting the books, taking care to keep the spine and front cover away from prying eyes.

"I can see their point, though. Colin's been in the Hospital Wing for a week, now. Madam Pomfrey can usually heal burns in moments – like Cedric's, in fourth year." Ron sat down and gazed absently at the books between them. "It wasn't like he was even doing anything, not like Malfoy. They didn't mind that so much…"

"I'm sure Malfoy minded. And Professor Snape." Hermione's voice was sharp as she rebuked him, but then softened. "Besides, he is scary. It was just luck that Malfoy didn't get more than a concussion, and Colin could have burned to death. Everyone thinks we're fools for still being with him."

"Yeah, I know."

Ron sat in silence as Hermione, equally despondent, magically bound the incriminating texts in parchment. Harry, on hearing that Madam Pince's protections on restricted texts were foiled by wrapping them in plain parchment to hide the title, had burst out laughing and still refused to tell Ron why. Hermione has seemed torn between amusement and disdain, convincing Ron that he needed to know why plain covers for books caused their reactions.

"Did you see the books Harry took?" He asked suddenly.

Hermione frowned as she lined up the edge of _The Sharing and Leaching of Power_ with the sheet of parchment. "I thought that was what you were doing. He took about three, didn't he?"

"Five," Ron grimly corrected. "All very dubious titles – soul arts, legilimency, possession and blood charms."

"Well, in all fairness, we're looking up blood charms, too."

"Yes, but yours isn't called _The Blood Sacrifice Retaliation_, is it?"

"You don't think he'd actually use those, do you?" Hermione was worried now; her hands had stilled completely and she looked at Ron with worried eyes.

"If he reads them, the idea's there, isn't it? He might think it's the only way."

"But – what about what we learnt in Defence? Using magic like that affects you, and with the amount of power Harry has now, it's really dangerous."

"So are you going to stop him?"

"Yes. I mean – if he reads it around us – because if he knows these dark arts, and his magic is so uncontrolled – he might do worse than burning, next."

"Ah." Ron bit his lip. "I hadn't though of that point. I really don't want to be around Harry when he's wildly spewing magic everywhere and can twist it into dark arts. Bugger. If you bring the issue up, I'll agree with you."

"No you won't, coward. You'll stay out of it so that Harry can vent his temper on me and then you can reason with him." Hermione smoothed the last temporary cover out before re-packing the books to take them up to her dormitory.

"'Mione, wait," Ron caught her sleeve as she started to stand up. "You said you found a problem today. What is it?"

Hermione looked at him and shook her head. "I can't believe we didn't think of this earlier. We're binding Harry to us, with blood and magic. What about the other blood bonds Harry has? How do you think those will affect us?" Without waiting for a reply she turned and left the nearly empty common room.

Ron sat there for a few minutes more.

Of course, You-Know-Who was bonded to Harry – it was his blood that resurrected him. But was it the scar or the blood bond that caused Harry to harm students, and to scream almost every night as he saw the Death Eaters' atrocities? Yes, Harry had dreamed before the resurrection, but not every night. Did it make a difference, considering the rituals that would bind both their blood and magic? You-Know-Who had raised power through a blood ritual that summer, surely that meant that the magic came to Harry through the blood?

If they were bound to Harry, would Ron and Hermione be vulnerable to him in the same way? And did that affect Ron's decision?

_It's for Harry, to help him. I said I'd die for him. Hell, I've risked dying for him before now. But the visions…and possession. It might not happen, but it could. Dumbledore said himself that blood rituals affect each other in unpredictable ways._

_Can I do this, put my mind at risk? And if You-Know-Who finds out, my whole family will be primary targets, too. Can I risk them?_

_Can I risk Hermione?_

_Can I go through what Harry does, to help him survive?_

It was a full hour before Ron headed up to bed, but when he did, he knew that the answer had been decided six years earlier on a chessboard.

It had always been "Yes".

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Harry had turned away from Ron and Hermione the moment they climbed through the portrait hole. The common room was still fairly busy, with almost all the older students still awake among the remnants of that afternoon's celebration. He walked hurriedly through the groups of people, ignoring the half-glances, the mutterings, and the silenced conversations being hastily restarted in voices that were a shade too loud and cheerful. He particularly ignored the worn red armchair by the fire, where he used to sit. The fire – where he had talked to Sirius last, before killing him with his own stupidity. Ginny was sitting there, tonight, talking animatedly to Dean. He determinedly did _not_ see her flush as she almost rose to speak to him, only to be pulled down by her boyfriend.

Nor did he let himself look at the rest of the Quidditch team, the current darlings of the House. They weren't the centre of attention, though, sitting at a table in the corner, muttering among themselves. Kirke and Sloper shot him dark looks, and Harry forced himself not to react. He hurried up the stairs to his dormitory, shutting the door behind him. It wasn't until he had flung himself, face down, onto the red and gold blankets of his bed that he let out a long shuddering breath, struggling not to let it turn into sobs.

_Outcast again, with the stares again, and Sirius, I can't even talk to you about it like I could before, when Ron was mad at me. Now it feels like the whole school's mad, and half of them are scared stiff. Those first years, today, Sirius, they actually turned and ran when I was in the corridor. And all the staff keeping watch in case I lose control again, except the greasy git, who just wants to provoke me into it, and talks about you all the time and I don't know how I can just sit there and listen and it just makes it harder to stay under control…_

_I'm scared, Sirius. All this – it's too much. I can handle being the bloody Boy-Who-Lived, I can handle Snape and the Slytherins, I could even deal with being a parselmouth. But seeing him every night, what he does. Ron said I screamed so loud that the whole tower heard, and so they're even more scared, and McGonagall listens to me talk and sends me off to Pomfrey for a throat soothing potion, but she says she can't do anything about it that might make me dangerous. As for Dumbledore, he can hardly bear talking to me anymore, but he said it might be too risky for me to stay at Hogwarts, if I threatened other students. Hell, Sirius, it's scary. Even Malfoy's scared, though I can't blame him. I'd be scared of me too, after what I did. But I didn't mean to, Sirius! Honestly I didn't. It just kind of surged through me, and I couldn't stop it. But even Snape's worried about what I might do, I think. Not that it stops him – he'd love to see me expelled. _

_We won the game today, Sirius. It was brilliant, diving after it, and I felt so guilty afterwards. Cedric's dead, Bertha Jorkins, that old muggle, Mr. Weasley was bitten, and I killed you, and Professor Lupin went of to Pakistan ages ago and hasn't even come back for the Wolfsbane Potion, I overheard Snape tell McGonagall. He hates me now, you know. I don't blame him – I killed the only friend he had left, the last-but-one Marauder. And if he's bitten or killed people, or been hunted, then that's my fault too._

_It's stupid, you know, Sirius, because this summer was actually good. I suppose Voldemort was concentrating on his own little raising power ritual thing, but I hardly dreamed at all. The Dursleys even let me alone for the most part – I guess Moody really scared them at the station. Either that or they looked at me and could tell that I'm a murderer. But they let me just stay in my room and think about you, Sirius. And other things. About how Dumbledore needs me, to carry out the prophecy, and he wants me to be trained and powerful for that. But I'm too strong now, Sirius. Too unpredictable. When a weapon can't do what it was designed for, you get rid of it. I think that's what he's doing, really. Ignoring me so that I'll realise that he doesn't want me any more – I'm a liability. I can be used by Voldemort – lead people into traps and get them fucking killed! Gods, Sirius, I'm sorry. _

_But that's what I spent this summer thinking about. Well, I had to work it out for myself, he wasn't going to tell me. Like he wouldn't tell me about the Occlumency or the prophecy…_

_Hermione would say I was brooding all summer. She thinks I do too much of that, you know. She's enlisted Ron to help her get me to stop. Whenever I get too deep in my thoughts, one of them's there, wanting me to go to the kitchens, or out to the lake, to visit Hagrid, or even to actually work rather than staring at blank parchment. I reckon she thinks I'm depressed. And now they're working on this, and they're so determined that it will work, that it will help. They don't realise that nothing helps a murderer. _

_And I'm scared for them. They'll only get hurt for trying to help me, and I know it. It would be better if they just stopped and left me alone, but they won't. I should try to push them away – they'd be safer if they had nothing to do with me – but I'm too weak to make them hate me. But they'll be killed, I know it, Sirius, and I hate that. Why can't they see that everyone near me gets hurt? Maybe I should just run away – creep out to Hogsmeade in my cloak, and then fly off – to Europe, or America, or just some island where no one will find me. _

_But then there'd be no one to kill Voldemort. I don't want to kill, Sirius! I know I'm a murderer, but I don't want to be, and if I stay I have to, because Dumbledore needs me, to stop him killing others. But…I don't want to. How is it possible that I'm the one bloody hope of the whole fucking world? _

Harry drew the curtains around his four-poster and curled up under the covers. When Neville, Dean and Seamus came up to the dormitory, he pretended to be asleep. When Ron came up, later, and hissed his name, he ignored it. Later still, when steady breathing and Seamus' snores were the only sounds in the room, Harry kicked his shoes off and cast his usual silencing charm at the curtains. He lay on his back and drifted into an uneasy sleep. Nobody heard when he screamed.

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**Author's Note: **Hmmm…I'm not sure how well that worked. Angst is a tricky thing to write, as are thoughts and character development. I hope I managed to get Ron's dilemma across okay. Constructive criticism is, as always, rapturously welcomed. Flames are also appreciated – anything to let me know that there are people reading this. I'm beginning to see the advantage of Skyhawke – counting hits as well as reviews. Hopefully the next chapter will be up before long (possibly Monday or Tuesday).


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